Using Technology to Deepen Democracy, Using Democracy to Ensure Technology Benefits Us All
Sunday, September 30, 2018
Sunday Walk
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
4 out of 5 Americans have less than one year’s income saved in retirement accounts.
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 30, 2018
Congress needs to do more to ensure all Americans can retire with security and dignity. #ForThePeople.https://t.co/V2LZZKXNRv
Emoluments Santa Claus?
One wonders if Donald Trump is enjoying a few days where the microscope is trained on someone other than him. Certainly, it's allowed a few somewhat embarrassing stories to largely fly under the radar. One of these is a ruling that U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan issued on Friday, which says that a lawsuit that 200 Democratic senators and representatives filed against Trump, charging him with violating the Constitution's emoluments clause, can move forward. This day was bound to arrive sooner or later, once Trump decided not to divest himself of his business holdings. Given how vague the emoluments clause is... it is not clear that Trump has violated the Constitution. But it is also not clear that he hasn't. [He clearly has, ask Jimmy Carter --d] That makes it a matter for the courts; the only issue was finding someone who has standing to sue. Now, we've got that someone (and there's also a case filed by the Attorneys General of Maryland and D.C. that is likely to be allowed to proceed). So, we are going to find out exactly what the limits of the emoluments clause are (and, as a byproduct, Donald Trump's tax returns are likely to become a matter of public record). [bolded passages bolded by me --d]
Kavanoff
Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), the leading Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, told ABC News that if Brett Kavanaugh is confirmed as a Supreme Court justice, “the House will have to investigate” allegations of sexual assault and perjury if the Senate doesn’t “properly” do so through this week’s limited FBI probe. Said Nadler: “We can’t have a justice on the court who has been credibly accused of sexual assault, who’s been accused of other things, including perjury.”
Saturday, September 29, 2018
Today's Random Wilde
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
While Senate Republicans were advancing a #SCOTUS nominee accused of sexual assault, their @HouseGOP colleagues passed a new #TaxScam to benefit billionaires and wealthy corporations at the expense of working families.
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 29, 2018
One thing is clear: they are not working #ForThePeople. pic.twitter.com/Yz2kF1ZEHz
Friday, September 28, 2018
Roosevelt Institute On Reviving Antitrust
As concentrated corporate power threatens jobs and wages and worsens inequality, the Roosevelt Institute and the Great Democracy Initiative (GDI) today released two new papers outlining a progressive framework to reform America’s failing antitrust system. Addressing key elements of the growing monopoly problem, the first report argues for taking antitrust policymaking out of the courts and empowering antitrust enforcers, while the second offers an alternative to the outdated consumer welfare standard, along with policy solutions to increase competition and protect workers and consumers. Together, the papers provide a progressive blueprint for a robust 21st century antitrust regime that can begin to address the United States’ market power crisis.
In Taking Antitrust Away From the Courts: A Structural Approach to Reversing the Second Age of Monopoly Power, Ganesh Sitaraman, Director of Policy and Co-Founder of the Great Democracy Initiative, explains the problems with court-established antitrust policy and outlines a set of institutional reforms to the Federal Trade Commission in order to reinvigorate antitrust policymaking. In shifting the policymaking role from judges, who have eroded existing regulations, to agency experts, Sitaraman recommends a series of bold policy reforms, including a newly empowered anti-monopoly agency, new standards and practices for merger evaluation, and expanded third party enforcement.
“Antitrust laws are only as good as their implementation and enforcement,” said Ganesh Sitaraman, Director of Policy and Co-Founder of the Great Democracy Initiative, and a Professor of Law at Vanderbilt Law School. “As our growing market power problem demonstrates, leaving antitrust policymaking to the courts does not work. We need a strong antitrust agency with the authority to take action that promotes competition and addresses market concentration.”
A second paper, The Effective Competition Standard: A New Standard for Antitrust, tackles the dangerous implications of the ambiguous and inadequate consumer welfare standard. Authored by Roosevelt Institute economist Marshall Steinbaum and Maurice E. Stucke, a Professor of Law at the University of Tennessee, the report argues in favor of a new effective competition standard. If adopted, this framework would protect competition in the economy, including in the labor market and throughout supply chains, by meeting several essential goals:
1) to protect individuals, purchasers, consumers, and producers;
2) to preserve opportunities for competitors;
3) to promote individual autonomy and well-being; and
4) to disperse and de-concentrate private power.
“The current antitrust standard is not working. Market power and monopsony have been growing in our economy for decades and are a major factor driving wage stagnation and decreasing worker protections,” said Marshall Steinbaum, Fellow and Research Director at the Roosevelt Institute. “Antitrust enforcers need tools to hold corporate power accountable and to better prioritize the interests of consumers and workers.”
The Roosevelt Institute has been a leading voice on antitrust policy and the need for bold policies to tackle market power. Roosevelt Chief Economist Joseph E. Stiglitz recently called for a new standard for antitrust during his keynote address at the ongoing FTC competition hearings. In 2018, the Roosevelt Institute released Powerless: How Lax Antitrust and Concentrated Market Power Rig the Economy Against American Workers, Consumers, and Communities, which outlines the 40-year assault on antitrust and competition policy. In 2018, Steinbaum also authored an issue brief titled A Missing Link: The Role of Antitrust Law in Rectifying Employer Power in Our High-Profit, Low-Wage Economy, which chronicled the ways the market power crisis is limiting worker power, depressing wages, and harming the economy. The Great Democracy Initiative has also championed progressive solutions to today’s skewed economy. In 2018, GDI released Regulating Tech Platforms: A Blueprint for Reform, which identified ways to break up and regulate technology platforms.
Working Not Working
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
Let’s be clear: Republicans are rushing this nomination through in an effort to derail any serious investigation of these allegations.
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 28, 2018
Advancing the nomination of an accused predator is irresponsible, insulting and dangerous. #DelayTheVote https://t.co/80JapuOCEz
Thursday, September 27, 2018
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
Dr. Blasey Ford has shown tremendous courage by coming forward and speaking out. If you’re a survivor, I know today will be extremely hard. Please call 800-656-HOPE if you need support. https://t.co/rwxKLlq7lq
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 27, 2018
Wednesday, September 26, 2018
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
“Real, sustainable peace does not come about by chance. It is hard and sometimes expensive work to support countries on their path from conflict to stability, but it is a lot cheaper than war in every sense.”
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 25, 2018
Thank you @AntonioGuterres for this must read↓https://t.co/zX0Ejb86sx
Zing Ding Ding
when a service "predicts" what "you" want, it is actually reshaping you into what makes it profitable
— Rob Horning (@robhorning) September 26, 2018
Tuesday, September 25, 2018
Bonus: Barbara Lee Speaks For Me On Voter Registration Day
It’s National #VoterRegistrationDay! Here are some important dates you need to know from our Secretary of State, @AlexPadilla4CA. pic.twitter.com/RtN7Axa2Ye
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 25, 2018
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
How is the Trump Administration paying to imprison thousands of children? By stealing from cancer research, public health services, and HIV/AIDS programs.
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 24, 2018
This government would rather commit child abuse than work #ForThePeople. Despicable.https://t.co/y1eI8AzKy5
Monday, September 24, 2018
Long Teaching Day
Sunday, September 23, 2018
Sunday Walk
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
It’s an unfair reality that African Americans in America are not safe from police brutality. Every day in this country, they fear for their safety, must fight against prejudice, and suffer from racial profiling. When will it end?https://t.co/5EhROySN3Y
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 23, 2018
Saturday, September 22, 2018
Today's Random Wilde
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
Social Security, food stamps, housing subsidies and other lifelines kept 44 MILLION Americans out of poverty last year.
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 21, 2018
Anti-poverty programs work. You know what doesn’t? Trickle-down economics that allow billionaires to hoard wealth and pay their workers poverty wages. https://t.co/w9trHdkQOn
Friday, September 21, 2018
Strategies to Rebuild Worker Power for the Global Economy
Privileging firms that cooperate well with unions;
Making labor law enforcement more favorable toward labor;
Extending union contracts to non-union workers;
Structurally incorporating unions into the policymaking process;
Allowing unions to manage public benefits; and
Making union membership the default status for workers.
Recent Supreme Court decisions like Janus v. AFSCME reveal that the state (of which courts are a part) can and does put its thumb on the scale against labor. Thus, policy could instead actively tilt the other way. This paper proposes a fundamental re-visioning of the role of government in rebuilding worker power, which has a stronger foothold when it benefits from more than just one base of support. Instead of defeatist resignation, modest legal changes, or waiting for unions to save themselves, Tucker recommends ambitious and linked strategies at the international and domestic level to strengthen labor institutions across the globe.
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
Donald Trump lied. The #GOPTaxScam was never going to help American families, it was written to benefit corporations and billionaires.
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 20, 2018
Americans deserve a government that works #ForThePeople, not for the wealthiest 1%.https://t.co/sJWM4AeFVv
Thursday, September 20, 2018
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
One year later, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands are still recovering from Hurricane Maria. They deserved a government that would help them after disaster struck — and the Trump Administration failed them. https://t.co/UrUhUGNqUg
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 20, 2018
Wednesday, September 19, 2018
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
When Anita Hill told her story, the Senate didn’t listen. Let’s not repeat the same mistakes of our past. The U.S. Senate should #BelieveWomen and #PostponeTheVote on Brett Kavanaugh.https://t.co/R3eNn1Vqz3
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 18, 2018
Tuesday, September 18, 2018
Abolish Environmental Racism
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
THIS from @RevDrBarber: “The weight of poverty lies squarely on the shoulders of politicians who lack the will and political courage to truly eradicate poverty despite abundant resources to do so.” https://t.co/bhoM37z815
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 18, 2018
Monday, September 17, 2018
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
Today marks 50 days until Election Day! Trump and Republicans in Congress have brought chaos and harm to so many this past year and a half. We now have a chance to turn that tide. Let’s vote in those who will improve labor rights, LGBTQ rights, women’s rights, and more.
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 17, 2018
A Hard Day Ahead
Sunday, September 16, 2018
Sunday Walk
Saturday, September 15, 2018
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
The 2001 #AUMF has been used across three presidencies, at least 41 times in nineteen different countries.
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 15, 2018
This is what #EndlessWar looks like. Congress needs to do its job and hold a real debate on the costs & consequences of our shadow wars.https://t.co/BsgYYXh2Z9
Friday, September 14, 2018
Prep...
Today's Random Wilde
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
If we take back the House and Senate in November, we can focus on:
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 14, 2018
✅Medicare For All
✅Equal pay for women
✅Investing in good jobs
✅Infrastructure
✅Affordable education
But first, we have to elect leaders who will fight for these issues → https://t.co/hV5py4qUvD.
Thursday, September 13, 2018
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
This shows a complete disregard for human life. Unbelievable. https://t.co/ct0sVkr3RL
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 13, 2018
Wednesday, September 12, 2018
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
Rep. Barbara Lee was the only person in Congress who voted against an endless war after 9/11 — she’s now running to be the first Black woman to serve in House Democratic leadership pic.twitter.com/6kyRUXU0DY
— NowThis (@nowthisnews) September 11, 2018
Tuesday, September 11, 2018
Shorter Teaching Day
Today's Random Wilde
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
Congress - not the President - has the constitutional responsibility over war powers. It’s past time for us to repeal the 2001 #AUMF blank check for war and hold an honest debate about the costs & consequences of endless war. https://t.co/XntXc6IiQk
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 8, 2018
Monday, September 10, 2018
Long Teaching Day
Sunday, September 09, 2018
Another World Is Possible...
900+ actions. 95 countries. People everywhere rose up to tackle climate change and show our leaders how to build a fossil free world. Thank You!
— 350 dot org (@350) September 9, 2018
Rise with us for the next wave of actions, one month from today: https://t.co/gIquaWVt2K pic.twitter.com/vDYyKeAJEA
Sunday Walk
Saturday, September 08, 2018
Keep Fighting for the Prison Strike Agenda
Tomorrow is the last official day of #PrisonStrike2018. But it's important that we continue to push the agenda forward on all fronts. And reporting on the strike & responding to repression should continue for months as prisons come off lockdown & continue to punish participants. pic.twitter.com/f5OMfAMoyg— #August21 🇵🇸 (@jaybeware) September 8, 2018
Elonging
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
In a leaked email, Judge Kavanaugh expressed that Roe v. Wade could be easily overturned. The rights of all women are in danger if he is confirmed. We must keep up the pressure. https://t.co/AJkyvtWPXc
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 7, 2018
Friday, September 07, 2018
More On A Public Banking Option
Roosevelt Institute Fellow Mark Paul and Assistant Professor of Economics at Loyola Marymount University Thomas Herndon make the case for a public banking option, emphasizing the historical precedent set by President Franklin D. Roosevelt: “A forgotten lesson of the New Deal era is that a public option for basic services can both ensure universal access and empower regulators to curtail abuses. In the case of consumer finance, a public bank would go a long way toward improving the economic security of all U.S. households.”Apart from and a part of urgent ongoing abolition struggles -- struggles to abolish white supremacy and patriarchy, pollution and waste, police brutality, prisons, nuclear weapons, illiteracy, homelessness, food insecurity, neglected treatable diseases and malnutrition, corruption, and so much more -- the work to provide a public option for banking (in part, I hope, via an expanded postal service), a public option for healthcare (in part via Medicare buy-in and Medicaid expansion), public options for internet and phone and streaming services (in part via community co-ops and expanded commercial-free national public radio and television programs with fairness doctrines and regulations against deceptive and fraudulent advertising and misinformation practices), public alternatives for sustainable energy, transportation, and food provision (mostly through co-ops and infrastructure and organic/permaculture farms and farmer's markets built and maintained and subsidized via full guaranteed public employment at a living wage programs -- not the basic income re-feudalization scam advocated by oligarchic "thought leaders" of tech) is looking like the work of the rising generation with whatever help my own eclipsed ineffectual dwindling generation can provide them as they rise in their diversity, awareness, rage, and promise.
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
The Trump Administration announced yesterday their plan to hold migrant children in detention indefinitely. These children need us to do something. Stand with me to oppose this heartless decision. https://t.co/hPMa9dzFzM
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 7, 2018
Thursday, September 06, 2018
Today's Random Wilde
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
America’s complicity in this humanitarian nightmare must end. Our war in Yemen violates both the constitution and basic human rights.
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 6, 2018
Congress should pass our War Powers Resolution immediately and end U.S. involvement in this vicious, brutal war. #YemenCantWait https://t.co/oK5jaIz4Aj
India Strikes Down Sodomy Laws and Endorses Principle of Equal Treatment for LGBTQ People
It’s official: India has struck down its century-old law criminalizing gay sex. In a historic verdict announced Thursday, a five-judge panel ruled Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code is unconstitutional. First enacted during British rule in the 1860s, the colonial codes outlaw “unnatural offenses… against the order of nature.” All four opinions submitted to the court were concurring, showing unanimous agreement. Justices concluded LGBTQ people are guaranteed equal treatment under the constitution and that anti-gay discrimination violates freedom of expression.Joyful images of joy (for example, these via Buzzfeed) bring me joy. Nice to remember, how marvelous joy is. This is great news, and there is a big rolling world for the rising, secularizing, diversifying, greening, abolition-democratizing American coalition to join up with as we destroy the last vestiges of cisheteronormative white supremacist authoritarian extractive-industrial corporate-militarism here in sick sad Trumpworld.
Wednesday, September 05, 2018
Today's Random Wilde
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
This is who Brett Kavanaugh is. #StopKavanaugh https://t.co/uaYAlOyFK8
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 4, 2018
Tuesday, September 04, 2018
Teaching Today
Today's Random Wilde
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
The deadline for reuniting families was FIVE weeks ago, but hundreds of children are still separated from their parents.
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) August 31, 2018
This is government sanctioned child abuse. It’s a violation of human rights. And it’s another stain on our nation’s soul. #EndFamilySeparation https://t.co/pXGaxql4RW
Coming Crisis Blogging...
Trump has been able to get away with the political equivalent of murder largely because the Republican-led Congress protects him, refusing to do its constitutional duty. It won’t call him on his many lies; it won’t investigate his financial conflicts of interest; it won’t hold his Cabinet members accountable; and with the exception thus far of the Senate Intelligence Committee, it won’t even seriously investigate Russian interference in the 2016 election. House committees led by Democrats would do all of these things and more. The most immediate threat to Trump from the election is not impeachment, though we may eventually reach that point. Rather, it is the prospect of genuine oversight and serious investigation. Scrutiny is Trump’s kryptonite. The other thing Trump fears, of course, is the Robert S. Mueller III investigation writ large. The probe by the special counsel has now metastasized to involve the Southern District of New York, the New York state attorney general and the Manhattan district attorney. Trump’s former campaign chairman was convicted on eight felony counts, and his former personal lawyer pleaded guilty to eight felonies — on the same day. Trump’s longtime accountant and a tabloid publisher who kept Trump’s secrets locked in a safe are talking to prosecutors under grants of immunity. Nothing in Trump’s history suggests he is going to sit back and let this process unfold — and perhaps destroy him. Everyone should assume this will get ugly. [Emphasis mine.--d] Trump desperately wants an attorney general who will shut Mueller down. The incumbent, Jeff Sessions, cannot do so because he is recused from the matter. Republican senators who once warned Trump not to dare fire Sessions now seem resigned to the fact that Trump will do just that. It makes sense for Trump to make his move after the election. [Don't count on it, then.--d] If Republicans still control Congress, he’ll get away with it. If Democrats take charge, he won’t. If anyone asks you what’s at stake in November, tell them democracy and justice.
Monday, September 03, 2018
Labor Day Adjunct Organizing Read
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
Things we wouldn’t have without organized labor:
— Rep. Barbara Lee (@RepBarbaraLee) September 3, 2018
✔️ A minimum wage
✔️ Child labor laws
✔️ Workplace safety standards
✔️ Overtime pay
On #LaborDay (and every day!) I’m fighting for working people and their fundamental right to organize. Happy Labor Day!
Saturday, September 01, 2018
Today's Random Wilde
Barbara Lee Speaks For Me Daily
Gun violence is a public health epidemic. The United States is one of the top six countries that make up more than half of gun deaths worldwide. Senseless gun violence is rampant; we need background checks and an assault weapons ban now. https://t.co/6xyvgt0sOR
— Barbara Lee (@BLeeForCongress) September 1, 2018